A rendering of the exterior at Quinnipiac University's Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine.

A rendering of the exterior at Quinnipiac University's Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine.

Photo: Contributed Photo

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A rendering of a lecture hall at Quinnipiac University's Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine.

A rendering of a lecture hall at Quinnipiac University's Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine.

Photo: Contributed Photo

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Quinnipiac/St. Vincent’s medical school wins approval

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In a move that should help address the state's doctor shortage, Quinnipiac University soon will have a medical school. And it will have significant ramifications in this area.

The new medical school, which will have St. Vincent's Medical Center in Bridgeport as its primary clinical partner, received unanimous approval from the state Board of Education on Wednesday. Coupled with the announcement that the school also received preliminary accreditation from the Liaison Committee on Medical Education, Quinnipiac can start recruiting future doctors immediately.

Quinnipiac's Frank H. Netter M.D. School of Medicine is expected to enroll a charter class of 60 students in August 2013 and grow to 275 students by 2017. Dr. Bruce Koeppen, founding dean of the new medical school, told the state board that the doctors Quinnipiac will create won't bury themselves in research labs, but rather be primary care physicians.

"Not only will it help address the current physician shortage, but it will provide long-term benefits to the state," said Elizabeth Beaudin, director of nursing and workforce initiatives for the Connecticut Hospital Association. "Because of health reform, more people will be receiving coverage. As such, we need more primary care physicians who will be involved in prevention and health promotion, as well as chronic disease management. This will ultimately result in healthier communities and fewer avoidable hospital visits."

Although clinical rotations are two years away, Koeppen said students would start getting clinical experiences at St. Vincent's in year one. "I expect eventually our medical students will set up free screening clinics for people in Bridgeport who don't have access to medical care or who can't afford it," said Koeppen.

Dr. Stuart G. Marcus, president of St. Vincent's Medical Center, said the alliance would change the culture of St. Vincent's and raise the bar for everybody. "Faculty members at St. Vincent's are looking forward to educating students in the clinical sciences and teaching them the principles of safe, reliable patient care of the highest quality," Marcus said.

In their third year of training, medical students will spend the majority of their time rotating through various departments at the hospital, including surgery, medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, pediatrics, psychiatry and family medicine. In year four, students will rotate through the intensive care and the emergency departments. The students will also have a presence in St. Vincent's outpatient sites, as well as two secondary training sites: MidState Medical Center in Meriden and Middlesex Hospital in Middletown.

The school will be located on Quinnipiac's North Haven campus. Koeppen anticipates the initial class will be selected from a pool of 2,000 to 3,000 applicants. The university is nearing completion of a new medical school classroom building and has hired 19 of 20 new faculty members. So far, Quinnipiac has spent $100 million on the effort.

This is the first time St. Vincent's has taken a lead clinical role with a medical school. Koeppen said he visited 16 hospitals in the state and invited them to become clinical partners. Five applied. All submitted position papers to outline what their partnership would look like.

That Bridgeport had a medically underserved population and didn't have a medical school affiliation attached to one of its hospitals played into the decision to select St. Vincent's, Koeppen said.

Now all three major cities in the state will have a medical school at its service: Hartford has the University of Connecticut and New Haven has Yale.

Terry Jones, a state Board of Education member from Shelton, asked whether Quinnipiac also would work with smaller hospitals in the state, such as Griffin in Derby. Koeppen said he has had discussions with Griffin and that some Quinnipiac students could do rotations there.

Quinnipiac is one of 18 new medical schools in the nation being developed to help address an anticipated doctor shortage. In 2010, there was a shortage of 13,700 physicians nationwide, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.

The gap is expected to get wider in 2014, when the biggest piece of the health care reform package goes into effect, giving 32 million more Americans access to health insurance. The Association of American Medical Colleges' Center for Workforce Studies predicts that the shortage will grow to 62,900 doctors by 2015 and to 91,500 by 2020.

Koeppen said the number of baby boomers reaching Medicare age will exacerbate the shortage. In addition, nearly 40 percent of the 770,000 physicians in the country are baby boomers headed toward retirement.

Just because there will now be more doctors trained in the state, that doesn't mean they will stay here to do residency or eventually practice here. Foley pointed out that, in 2011, less than 10 percent of Yale University Medical School stayed in Connecticut for residency training and about 30 percent of University of Connecticut medical school graduates stayed in state for their residencies.

It's unclear whether a larger percentage of those trained at Quinnipiac would stay in the state, but Foley said the new school still is a positive step.

"It would be better if we could keep them here, but just getting them here is a good thing," he said.

Koeppen said facilities would be unmatched. "I've seen lots of medical schools. Having the chance to build this from scratch, I took all of the good ideas I saw and didn't do anything that didn't work," he said of the 145,000-square-foot facility to be completed by March 1.

With the medical school, Quinnipiac will become one of fewer than 100 universities in the country to have both medical and law schools. Quinnipiac inherited a law school that had its start at the University of Bridgeport in 1992.